My husband has been asking me to make this logo for him and his buddies for a year now. I finally put it on my to-do list and sat down to do it last night. I’m really happy with the results, and grateful to a lot of people who uploaded some how-to videos on Photoshop.

I posted a couple of teaser screenshots on social media yesterday. This was the first one that gave anyone an idea of where the piece was going and I got a few laughs out of it.

Here is the final piece : The official logo for the Bad A** League of Ordinary Gentlemen.

I don’t know what they’re using it for. But I am not a gentlemen so I suppose that their business is their own!

Day 6 was a favorite book character. The challenge specifies that it couldn’t be a movie. I know there -is- a movie for this book, but I’ve not seen it…so for me it doesn’t count. I DO WHAT I WANT. ❤ The Little Prince.

Day 7: favorite word. This one had me puzzled. I like a lot of words? Raine mentioned a word the other day that I really liked and I wish I had used it…of course I can’t remember what it was, though. Ah well!

Day 8: favorite animated character. Ugh, I don’t have enough space for this one. So I just selected some that stand out for me. Tak from Invader Zim, Jane from Daria, Raichu from Pokemon, Disney’s Mulan, and Midna from Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

Day 9 : favorite TV show. Absolutely Battlestar Galactica. I like other shows like Once Upon A Time, Friends, Walking Dead, and more…but this seemed appropriate.

Day 10: favorite candy. PEPPERMINT ANYTHING/EVERYTHING.

Day 11: Turning Point in your life. I knew what I was doing for this day from the first time I skimmed the topics. The day that Raine texted me for the first time and asked me to hang out. We didn’t spend a day apart after that ❤

Also, I did another time-lapse painting video! It is called Heart of Stone. Check it out below!

]]>https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2015/05/21/drawing-challenges-pt-2-and-another-video/feed/0heartofstonexenophonicaday 6day 7day 8day 9day 10day 11heartofstoneDrawing Challenges and Experimentshttps://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/drawing-challenges-and-experiments/
https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/drawing-challenges-and-experiments/#respondWed, 13 May 2015 03:40:51 +0000http://xenophonica.wordpress.com/?p=1762]]>I decided I needed some inspiration with my sketching and decided I’d do a search for drawing challenges on Pinterest and do the first one that came up. I was thinking like…A SUBJECT, but the first image was a 30 day drawing challenge. Well, I set myself up for that one. Here’s my progress so far:

Day 1 : Yourself. I also challenged myself that I wouldn’t scrap anything I started but would make it work no matter what. You can probably see a sketch I started underneath that I didn’t like. However, I really liked the raw style that came out here.

Day 2 : Favorite animal. Cat, duh. I like purple a lot and it is alive and well in most things I do lately. So, here’s a cat.

Day 3: Favorite food. I debated this one. Sushi? Steak? Seafood? Roasted veggies? I came back to the super glue of all foods, the thing that can make just about anything taste even better : bacon.

Day 4: Favorite place. Lately I really enjoy being lost in a book with a hot cup of tea or hot chocolate. It may not really be a “place”, but it is somewhere I enjoy being, because I visit so many places within pages of a book. The style of this piece was much more subdued than the days before (and the day after). I was kinda in a funk. But I committed to myself that I was going to do this challenge : can’t punk out on day 4.

Day 5: Best friend. My husband is my best friend. He makes me laugh, comforts me, supports me, and occasionally drives me crazy, but I love him all the same. I really wanted an excuse to draw him in his epic dwarf beard, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity. It really came out well, I’m really proud of this one.

I’m going to need to keep up with this blog a bit more in the near future because I am hoping to actually get some more visitors soon! Many readers here know that I am a tattoo artist (that took a break upon a move to Texas), a mother, half of Initiative : Tabletop, and an artist. Some changes have happened and are happening that will *hopefully* increase the need to update places like this more often. So, huzzah!

#1 – Publication??

I was recently commissioned for 2 projects that involved me using my artistic abilities for some children’s books! I never thought my first publication would go in that direction but I will take it! It has been an honor to work on these projects. The first one I still cannot share as I am still under a NDA for it, but there will be an update about that once I can talk about it.

The other is a small book about a little girl named Kylie. This book is currently available in Kindle format and can be purchased on Amazon!

Cool, right? I was pretty stoked. Who am I kidding…I’m still stoked! Do you know how cool it is to type your name into Amazon and something actually show up?

#2 Another Tattoo Shop

An opportunity has somewhat accidentally fell in my lap in regards to tattooing. A small shop not too far from where I live isn’t crazy busy right now but does need an additional artist. I figured this would give me a great in to this local community, and give me a legit place to work on those that are wanting work from me now.

#3 Getting My Art Groove Back On!

Doing work to get these books published as well as the opportunity to get back into a tattoo shop has really got my creative gears turning. In fact, I’ve done a few paintings recently and am going to be doing video recordings of said paintings. I did this painting a few days ago…

20 Sides to Every Story 11″x14″ Acrylics on Canvas

And I did a video of it! Check it out. And subscribe to my Youtube channel!

That’s all the updates I have for you today! I have a video going up on my Youtube channel for Mother’s Day, so make sure you’re subscribed!

]]>https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2015/05/06/artsy-updates-and-changes/feed/020 sides to every storyxenophonicakae is bad at blogging20 Sides to Every Story 11Illustration Friday and an extrahttps://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/10/11/illustration-friday-and-an-extra/
https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/10/11/illustration-friday-and-an-extra/#commentsSat, 11 Oct 2014 16:20:59 +0000http://xenophonica.wordpress.com/?p=1746]]>I’ve been severely lacking on my at for the last few months and I really want to reclaim it. It has been eating away at my soul and it needs some nurturing. I have two small pieces to share, one being a guided topic, the other based on a photo I took while living in Indiana.

First, Illustration Friday topic for the week is Octopus. I might do more than one piece, but this is the one I’ll be submitting.

Second is my photo reference.

That’s all!

]]>https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/10/11/illustration-friday-and-an-extra/feed/2xenophonicawp-1413047880244wp-1413047928241Texas, Y’allhttps://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/texas-yall/
https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/texas-yall/#respondSat, 30 Aug 2014 21:12:24 +0000http://xenophonica.wordpress.com/?p=1741]]>FASTFORWARD through nearly a month living with a friend and being separated from our family, we go to Indianapolis for Gen Con (woo hoo!) and made the long drive down to Texas, and here we are.

Experience so far? Pretty darn good. Its hot (go figure), the spiders here are huge (but they’re harmless to people…I’ll let them slide as long as they stay out of the house), the people are really nice, and….a very small percentage of our belongings arrived on the first truck. In theory, the rest of our things will arrive next week, and we hope to get the office set back up, among other things.

I’ve been eating better since we got here, and I’m feeling really good. We are going to a small board game meetup group on Monday to play some games and meet some folks. On Wednesday, I’m taking little man to a local library that has preschool story hour. And in a couple of weeks, we’ll be having a party for our little man’s 3rd birthday! Hopefully, some friends of ours that moved down to Texas a couple of years ago can make it. I miss them so much, and I know her little girl will have a great time with my boy!

Things I like most : the pond that is full of catfish…and I keep thinking about how tasty they’ll be once they’re being grilled. I enjoy that even though it is hot, it is a dry heat and that there is almost always a light breeze, which certainly makes it more tolerable. I really like the house we’re in, and things are coming along nicely so far as we try to put ourselves back together with jobs and building back up.

I’m excited to start gardening, as well as crafting. I can’t wait for the rest of my stuff to get here so that I can get back to doing artsy things. I have so many things planned for Tobias to start some preschool activities with him. We’ve already had the chance to do some fun learning activities now that I’m not working, and I’m loving being back with him.

I’ve got some work to do today, but I promise an update sooner than the last one!

]]>https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/texas-yall/feed/0texasxenophonicatexasA Light At The End of the Tunnel and Aspirationshttps://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/06/30/a-light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel-and-aspirations/
https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/06/30/a-light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel-and-aspirations/#respondTue, 01 Jul 2014 02:45:49 +0000http://xenophonica.wordpress.com/?p=1738]]>It has been a while since my last update, but a lot has been going on.

Since my last post, we put our house on the market, dealt with many showings and moving pets, and have sold the house! In that timeframe, my parents also took a trip out to Texas to do some house-hunting, and settled on and bought a house. Everything is lining up, and I’m glad to finally have some dates to look forward to. We take possession of the house on August 4th, and Raine and I should arrive in Texas sometime on August 19th, right after Gen Con.

So, needless to say, things have been very chaotic. I’m working, Raine is enjoying some time as a stay-at-home-dad for the first time since Tobias was born, and we are still pushing forward with Initiative : Tabletop. Yeesh!

I’m excited and anxious to move, because I hate the feeling of being in limbo. I am putting a lot of energy into focusing on savoring the time I have left with friends instead of being sad about it. I don’t want to say goodbye to these people, just that I’ll see them down the road.

The prospect of returning to life as a stay-at-home-mom is both thrilling and scary. I’m kind of in the groove of working now, but I so miss spending time at home with my son. I’m 95% sure I’m going to attempt to homeschool/unschool my kid, and I know that it takes a lot of time, effort, and it has to start sooner than later. I hope to provide so much for him, and maybe its that idea of the “perfect mom”, but I do worry that I’ll fall short. I’m trying to focus on providing him with the best I can do, rather than strive for goals I may never reach.

Would I like to feed him a primal diet and keep refined sugars and such out of his system? Of course.
Give him all of my focus and attention? Yes.
Have a perfect schooling experience and feel confident in my ability to teach him what he needs in life? I think everyone who decides to do this does.

I do aspire to give him the best chance possible and raise him in a way that is healthy in all aspects. I have to remember that no moms are perfect, only capable of giving it all they got. And that’s what I -want- to do.

Most things are the same. I get up at the crack of dawn 4 days out of the week to go work in our local co-op deli, I come home and chase around my 2 1/2 year old who is quickly developing his own personality, spend time with my husband, but now its all at my parents house. We are officially out of our old place and helping my parents for the next step. In fact, I’m surrounded by boxes right now, and the first round of movers are coming tomorrow.

A lot of things have come back into perspective for me this week, through various causes. I’m easing back into getting my healthy lifestyle back on track, spending more time reading to my boy, making time for my spouse, and for games. We’ve probably played more games in the last week than we had in the last month…maybe two.

Got to try out Boss Monster finally, and I really enjoy it. Its not something I feel the need to play 3x a night, but its a nice game to break out for a quick competitive game with some humor. We’ve also been playing Vikings! Our first game was a 4 player game with my parents, and I enjoyed getting them involved and learning the game. A couple nights later, Raine and I played 2 player mode and I found it much more difficult, but I liked it. Its one of those rare games that I’m glad we played with max players first.

We were give the chance to demo Maha Yodha, a new card game on Kickstarter, too. I’m still forming my opinion of it, so I can’t say much on it. We’ve also been playing a game that won’t be on Kickstarter until June – I don’t even know if I can talk about it, but its about building machines and its pretty damn cool.

Of course, Magic is a regular thing to hit the table, and I do love playing EDH format. However, we did decide to pick up a few things to build some standard decks. Mainly to play shorter games. I thought about trying out new colors, but decided to remain loyal to my red/blue roots, and I’m glad I did. I’ve got a nasty little deck going!

I’m going to be writing out some plans on what to do with my art projects and tattoo work until the move. I’ve been thinking a lot about what to do with my tattoo career, but that thought stream is for another blog post entirely.

And while I did have to kinda drop my weekly “Because I Said I Would”s, I did actually accomplish one of them recently. One card said “I will find a way to make my mom enjoy brussels sprouts”. The other night, I fried up some bacon and onions and shredded brussels sprouts into a warm slaw, and she really enjoyed it. So, victory!

But otherwise, things have been chaotic with the move. There is still no sure destination in Texas, so that is probably what stresses me out the most. I’m just trying to take each day one at a time, stay flexible, and know that the day will end.

So, that thing. It is fast approaching and my head is in a spin. Since Raine left his job, he’s been home this week to help me pack and spend time with us when I am not at work, so that’s been pretty awesome. Today was a whirlwind of packing and loading the van up to take loads to the storage unit. Laundry on top of that and doing my best to avoid trying to clean until the rest of this madness is taken care of is draining.

We are close enough now that I feel that I can start packing up some of the kitchen stuff (I love cooking, so when it comes time to pack up my spatulas, you know that things just got real). My son just thinks that the mass amount of boxes are for him to climb and play in, but truth be told there are times that I still don’t know when, or what, to pack in them. This is going to be my first major move with all of my large paintings, and I think that the fact that I don’t have boxes for these monsters is giving me a headache.

We’ll be out of our house and into my parents’ house by the end of the month, and from there, its a waiting game. To my knowledge, they’re putting their house on the market sometime in May, and its just a matter of time until it sells. When it does…off to Texas.

Gaming

Rumor has it that I love games, and they’re so very true. Raine and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary on the 13th (AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW) and we celebrated it the best way we know how….geeking out. We attended LANWar. This was my first LAN not playing World of Warcraft, though. However, I played a lot of Diablo III (I’d only played on PS3 up until then), Hearthstone, Neverwinter, and I succumbed and bought Guild Wars 2. It was 50% off…how could I not?

We are also trying to wrap up some unfinished games that we were given to review from Gen Con last year (very few, mind you). A few of those will hit the table in the next couple of weeks, but we played a game sent to us recently tonight and enjoyed it quite a bit. The Agents – its a card game that looks difficult, but is very simple. But requires a lot of thought. You know what? Just wait for the review, it’ll make sense.

Also, Raine bought me MYTH. If you don’t know what this game is, get off of my blog, go look at this, add to the pool of tears I created for not backing it, then come back. I know, I know. My heart hurt too. But the gaping hole in my heart has been filled with the giant box that is MYTH.

(I got lost for about 45 minutes looking at board game memes looking for that above photo. Just thought you should know.)

My Confession

…dang, what was my confession? I’m sure that most people are reading this JUST for this section of the post. Hmm…

Ah, that’s right. I finally admitted (in a sense of I’m trying to do something about it) that I have a major time management problem. As seen with my above admission of losing myself on the interwebz looking at memes. *facepalm*

I’m going to start taking parts of my days and literally planning it out in 15-30 minute increments in order to actually get things done. Because I have too much stuff to do at this point to get behind. I have tattoos that need to be drawn/applied, places to call, emails to send, and I’m sitting here wasting time on a blog post, see sample 2 of my lack of time skills.

Sigh.

]]>https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/04/17/the-move-gaming-and-a-confession/feed/1bgg memexenophonicaA New Journey In Healthhttps://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/04/04/a-new-journey-in-health/
https://xenophonica.wordpress.com/2014/04/04/a-new-journey-in-health/#commentsFri, 04 Apr 2014 23:05:19 +0000http://xenophonica.wordpress.com/?p=1727]]>I know that I have readers that may not care, but I just wanted to share this, even if its just as a reminder for myself.

About 2 weeks ago, I decided to give the Paleo eating method a shot. One benefit is for my weight loss, but the other is just to cut out a good chunk of the processed food. I approached it cautiously, making the choice that I’d commit to doing 80% paleo, giving myself some wiggle room of 20%.

In the beginning, I found myself stressing out immediately about some things.

No milk? (I like almond milk more anyways, so maybe not so bad…)
No yogurt?? (I love me some greek yogurt.)NO CHEESE???? (For the love of all that’s good my family is from Wisconsin! Seriously??)
No wheat/bread/pasta? (What DOESN’T have wheat in it??)

Among other things…

I’ve read enough about how supposedly humans aren’t meant to consume milk past infancy, and while it will take some getting used to, I understand the logic there. I’ve also seen plenty of evidence about how wheat causes inflammation. I even have a minor (very minor) gluten allergy, so that’s probably a good thing to reduce, anyway.

So, in the first few days I found that I (kinda) wanted those things, but I stepped back and thought “how can I enjoy this food, but in a simpler way?”, and I started making changes. A BLT became more of a salad with mashed avocado as a dressing, lettuce wraps held my sammiches together, etc.

Have I had some non-Paleo things? Of course. I’ve used soy sauce here and there and ate a chocolate mint cookie from my work a few nights ago. But I haven’t felt bloated in 2 weeks. I feel fuller longer. I feel better about what I’m eating. And the best part? I’ve lost weight already. I think this is something I can maintain, which is something I’ve been searching for for YEARS.

I’ve enjoyed the meals I’ve made and recipes I’ve tweaked to put a Paleo twist on, and I hope this is something that will continue, because I am LOVING the way I feel right now. More than I can put into words.